Wondering where Windows Phone 7.8 updates have been hiding? You’re not alone, and over the past several weeks we’ve been keeping track of the latest news on just when you could hope to finally see this software arrive. That chatter’s largely been coming from Europe, and we heard from two of Nokia’s branches earlier this month. One reported that the update would be completed by the end of the month, but it was a bit of a craps shoot if any carriers would actually get it out to users within the same timeframe. On the other hand, another said that it would just be “a few days” until the update’s arrival, but that was already over a week ago. Today we have an actual carrier chiming in, claiming that its users will have access to Windows Phone 7.8 before the month’s out.

O2 took to Twitter to answer a question specifically about update availability for the Nokia Lumia 800, saying that the release will be accessible through Zune by the end of January. We’ve still got two weeks left to go in the month, but for all we know the update could already land next week.

On the other hand, we have heard that this O2 Twitter account has gotten some info wrong before, even being an official account and all, so this news may not be a 100% lock. Still, we’re hopeful, and imagine a whole lot of you WP7.5 users are as well.